Sudden Mania to become Pianists created upon hearing Steinway's Pianos at the Paris Exposition.

This cartoon conveys the wild popularity of the Steinway piano, the
musicality of which has just been demonstrated by famed pianist Desiré
Magnus, at the 1867 World's Fair in Paris.

Heinrich Steinweg, the founder of Steinway & Sons, began as a
woodworker and organ-maker in Germany before building his first piano in
1835. Although successful at his trade, he was stifled by economic
regulations and a faltering German economy in the 1840s. In 1849,
he sent his son, Charles, to New York City to avoid repercussions
from the young man's involvement in the failed liberal revolution of
1848. Charles reported positively on the opportunities that
America offered, so the next year Heinrich Steinweg and his family moved
to New York City.

After working three years for various firms, Steinweg established the
partnership of Steinway & Sons in March 1853, and the family began
building their own pianos in a loft on Varick Street in Manhattan.
(The first one produced can be seen today at the Metropolitan Museum of
Art.) Heinrich anglicized his last name for business purposes
because in the 1850s English-made pianos were considered the best in the
world, but the family did not change its name legally until the
mid-1860s.

Despite occasional downturns, the American economy had grown and
developed tremendously over the first half of the nineteenth century. The
resulting ever-higher standard of living for the expanding middle class
meant that many consumers wanted to fill their larger homes with the
latest amenities. By the 1850s, the piano was a symbol of social
respectability and refined taste, well suited as a focal point in
middle-class parlors. The rising popularity of the piano also
reflected an increased interest in music. It was played in
middle-class homes for sheer pleasure, personal improvement, and family
camaraderie.

Thus, Steinway entered the American piano market at an opportune
time. While his company needed and had the skill to build a
quality product, they also realized that marketing Steinway pianos was
of great importance. It was the middle son (of five), Henry Jr., who
proved to be the prime mover behind both Steinway's technical
innovations and marketing success.

With advertising in its
infancy, winning awards at fairs and exhibitions was a major way to earn
distinction and publicity for a company and its products. In 1855, Henry Steinway Jr. entered the Steinway piano at the
Metropolitan Mechanics Institute Fair in Washington, D.C., where it won
first prize, and at the more prestigious American Institute Exhibition
at the Crystal Palace in New York City, where it garnered acclaim from
the judges and the press.

By the end of the next year, the
increased awareness of Steinway pianos boosted sales nearly three times
higher than in 1854. The success allowed the company to move into
their own 175,000-square-foot factory (at Park and Lexington between
52nd and 53rd) in 1858. With steam engines powering elevators and much of the
woodworking equipment, it was the most mechanized factory in the city at
the time.

Henry Steinway Jr. constantly drew up plans for improving the piano,
and some of his innovations revolutionized the instrument. A major
problem was that the metal or wood plate holding the strings had to be
tuned every hour and limited the octave range, while the sturdier
cast-iron substitute resulted in a tinny sound. By 1859, Henry Jr.
had changed the shape of the cast-iron plate, over-strung the
soundboard, and altered the hammers. The result was more keys, with a
richer sound capable of more nuance in its volume.
He had produced the modern piano that remains, with only minor changes, the same today.

In 1859, Henry Steinway Jr.
followed the lead of his firm's chief competitor, Chickering, by
soliciting advertising testimonials from renowned pianists. He
also wined and dined influential music critics, newspaper editors, and
sheet music publishers. In later years, he sponsored American
tours by the world's top pianists, such as Anton Rubinstein (1872) and
Ignace Paderewski (1892), in exchange for their endorsements. By
1860, Steinway employed 300 workers, was valued at over $360,000, and
produced more than 1000 pianos annually.

Henry Steinway Jr., however,
was not satisfied with national recognition, but wanted to earn respect
in Europe, the music capital of the western world. In 1862, he
entered Steinway pianos at the London Exhibition. While
professional and amateur musicians were enthusiastic about the
instrument, the jurors did not fully appreciate the advances made by the
"Steinway system," and awarded the grand prize for pianos to
Broadwood, the English manufacturer that had previously set the industry
standard. Steinway, though, was judged the best American piano.

In the mid-1860s, William Steinway Jr. oversaw
construction of Steinway Hall on East 14th Street near Union Square, the
center of New York City's music district. The ornate, white-marble
building opened in 1866 as the second largest concert hall in the city,
with a 2000-seat auditorium, a 400-seat annex, music rooms, and
studios. On both sides of the grand entrance hall were open
showrooms for Steinway pianos, visible to everyone entering the building
to attend a concert of the New York Philharmonic (until Carnegie Hall
opened in 1891) or other events (e.g., a magic show). The
marketing strategy helped increase sales by 400 pianos the next year,
and sales rarely dipped below 2000 annually for the rest of the century.

The ultimate coup for Henry
Steinway Jr., which finally secured his firm's status as the world's
best piano-maker, is the subject of this cartoon: the 1867 World's
Fair (or Exposition) in Paris. For two months prior to its April
commencement, Steinway and Chickering each spent $80,000 promoting their
pianos through newspaper advertisements, posters, special catalogs, and
entertaining VIPs. Over 400 piano manufacturers exhibited at the
competition, and Steinway showed four models. In May, Steinway
& Sons won a gold medal, and in July won another gold medal, the
grand testimonial medal, and honorary membership in France's
distinguished Société des
Beaux Arts. Steinway & Company had become the first American
firm to win top prize in the piano category.

Their chief competitor,
Chickering, also won a gold medal and a special "Legion of
Honor" award from the French Government (which the company had
solicited). Furthermore, Chickering claimed that Franz Liszt endorsed their
piano, when, in fact, he had praised Chickering and
Steinway. Both American companies immediately launched an intense
marketing war, saturating newspapers with advertisements highlighting
their Paris Exposition awards (one for Steinway appears on the Harper's
Weekly page directly under this cartoon, while one for Chickering is
printed two columns over). Chickering erected a huge replica of
their Legion medal on top of their 57th Street factory in New York.

Steinway, however, surpassed
Chickering's endorsements by using statements from European
royalty--Austrian, Russian, Swedish, Spanish, Turkish, and even Queen
Victoria of England. The Paris World's Fair established Steinway
& Sons as the leading choice for pianos in Europe, and shortly after
the event the company was selling twice as many pianos as its nearest
competitor. Remarkably, the firm stayed in control of the Steinway
family until they sold it in 1972 to CBS. In 1985, it was
purchased by Robert and John Birmingham of Boston, and currently produces about
5,000 pianos a year.